


Drunken Compliments

by ThatsNoShipItsASpaceStation



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F, Fluff, Identity Reveal, Reveal
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-18
Updated: 2019-08-29
Packaged: 2020-09-06 16:36:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20294617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatsNoShipItsASpaceStation/pseuds/ThatsNoShipItsASpaceStation
Summary: While patrolling the city as Supergirl, Kara overhears a drunken Lena telling Sam that she thinks Supergirl is hot. After making sure to get both inebriated women home safely, she finds out Lena is much more direct when she's drunk.





	1. Supergirl is Hot

Kara was just finishing up yet another patrol of the city. She had spent all of the evening and half the night tracking down a human gang who had found a cache of Cadmus alien tech. Now things had returned to being quiet, and so Alex had finally given her the go-ahead to go home. Thank Rao she didn’t need as much sleep as a human, otherwise she would definitely not be ok at work tomorrow.

She passed by the L-Corp building on her way home, and then stopped in midair when she noticed that the light was still on in Lena’s office. It was nearly two in the morning! Was Lena still working? She scanned the building with her x-ray vision and saw not one but two people in Lena’s office, so she got closer to check it out.

She could hear voices already, but it would be better if she could also see without seeing someone’s insides – standard vision was much better than x-ray for most everyday purposes. Kara drifted closer as she listened.

“I’m saying,” Lena was saying, voice slurred, “Supergirl is _hot_.”

Kara almost fell out of the air in surprise. Did she mean temperature-wise, or … ?

“Is she _super _hot?” Sam giggled, also very obviously drunk.

Lena was apparently having none of this distraction, and continued very seriously (albeit slurred). “I mean I would definitely sleep with her,” Lena paused to take another drink. “Anytime, anywhere.”

Kara felt herself blushing despite herself. She could now see in through the balcony window, and saw that Sam and Lena were sitting on the couch in Lena's office with one open bottle and one empty bottle of some liquor on the coffee table.

Sam was nodding. “I can see that.”

“Can you?” Lena tried to turn and pin Sam with an intent stare, but the effect was somewhat spoiled by her listing gently to one side. After a second, Lena seemed to notice and pulled herself back upright. “You know she saved me a couple times, and those arms … I mean, she fights a lot, that must be a good work out, but she was holding me in those arms too, and WOW.” Lena makes a 'mind-blown' gesture with her hands, and thankfully she had already drained her glass before then, otherwise there would be stains on her couch.

Sam nods exaggeratedly as she pours herself more. Kara briefly wonders where Ruby is right now, but she knows that Sam is a very conscientious mom and would make sure she was taken care of before getting drunk with her boss.

“I hate flying,” Lena continues, “but she could take me flying anytime – she took me flying a few times. Mostly it was because she was rescuing me. But hey, if I’m not in a relationship I can enjoy that aspect of having my life in danger, being wrapped up in those _godlike_ arms. I think I deserve it.”

Honestly, Kara was impressed at the level of cohesion of Lena’s thoughts, given how much she was slurring and having trouble staying upright even while seated.

“Does this mean you’re giving up on your crush??” Sam asked in mock shock. “Lena Lutessa Luthor, I didn’t know you had it in you.”

Kara frowned. Who did Lena have a crush on? She listened more intently.

“What?? NEVER!” Lena announced dramatically, standing up off the couch with her empty glass still clutched in one hand. “I am the last of my line and I will keep my unrequited love till my dying breath!” She waved her hands around emphatically. Sam was laughing uproariously, almost falling off the couch.

Lena opened her mouth like she was about to continue, but she seemed to forget what she was going to say, and then tried to take a drink from her empty glass. She frowned at the glass like it had personally offended her by being empty, then clumsily set it down on the table and tried to refill it, but she missed the bottle with her hands and almost fell over. The drunk CEO decided that maybe it was best to try that while sitting down instead, and plopped down onto the couch.

At this point Kara decided she should step in – neither of them should be drinking anything else besides water, and they definitely couldn’t drive. She opened the balcony door and sped over to the couch to grab Lena’s hand before she could either grab or knock over the bottles of alcohol sitting on the table.

“Super hot!” exclaimed Sam on seeing her, and immediately fell into a fit of giggles.

Kara rolled her eyes, and looked at Lena, who was glaring at her hand trapped in Kara’s. She pulled up her other hand and attempted to free the first from Kara’s grip, but the hero simply grabbed that one too.

“Yep, oh look! It’s time to go home and sleep! Doesn’t that sound like fun?” Supergirl asked brightly, glancing dramatically over to the clock.

Lena seemed to have realized now that it was Supergirl holding her hands, and was looking up at her like she was some kind of puzzle to be solved.

Sam, however, was still laughing. “Sleep, huh? Who ya gonna sleep with?”

Lena snickered and blushed a bright red, and wriggled her hands, trying to free herself.

“Come on, up both of you,” she said, and scooped them up, one under each arm, holding them around the middle like a parent with errant children. Sam squealed in a strange combination of laughter and dismay, and Lena just snickered more. Kara suddenly realized that two drunk humans might be too much for her, and decided to call for help. Alex should still be awake, right? She was just talking to her.

Supergirl walked to the balcony, shifting both women into one of her arms so she could activate her earpiece, then shifted them back.

“Hello?” Alex’s voice didn’t sound sleepy, and Kara sighed a breath of relief, kicking off into the air and making sure to fly more gently than normal – she didn’t want to risk having any airborne accident on the way there.

“Are you at home yet?” she asked, heading for Alex’s apartment. She visually checked to make sure her two passengers were ok – Sam had her arms outstretched like she was flying, which admittedly she was, with her eyes closed, and Lena was tightly gripping Kara’s arm, although she didn’t seem scared. Then Kara remembered what the CEO had said about Supergirl’s arms and flushed.

“Just getting in, why?” Kara could hear keys in the background.

“I have a present for you.” Sam snickered from under the hero’s arm, but Kara ignored her.

Alex paused before answering, and by now Kara could see her standing in her apartment and looking at the front door suspiciously. “Whyyyyyy?” she asked pointedly, drawing out the vowel.

In answer, Kara landed on Alex's back patio and slid open the door. “It’s just for tonight,” she said as she strode in before Alex could protest. “I’m not going to look after both, so you're going to have to help me with at least one of them.”

Cutting off whatever Alex was going to say in response, Sam giggled and said very drunkenly, opening her arms wide, “I’m a present!” Kara set the drunk assistant CEO down on the couch and stepped back, keeping Lena in her arms.

Alex put a hand over her eyes and then slowly slid it downwards on her face.

“Great, that’s settled!” Kara said cheerily. “Have a good night!” And she promptly zipped back out of the sliding door to the patio and took off into the sky.

“KARA ZOR-EL DANVERS DON’T YOU DARE RUN OFF-”

But by that point Kara was too far away to hear more without focusing on her hearing, which she didn’t want and wasn’t going to do right now. She had shifted to hold Lena in both her arms, having scooped up the other woman's legs with her newly-freed arm as she took off.

Lena giggled, and said, “Supergirl?” Her voice had dropped an octave and was doing weird things to Kara’s insides.

“Hmm?” Supergirl hummed, sounding a bit strangled, and she fervently hoped the other woman wouldn’t notice.

“Are you taking me home?” Lena asked lowly, head tilting to the side.

Now Kara didn’t have so much have butterflies in her stomach as full on winged riots. “Ye-es?” She replied, voice cracking mid-word.

Lena ducked her head into Kara’s shoulder and giggled again, and Kara worried that if she blushed any more that her suit might combust. Luckily by that point they were reaching Kara’s apartment, and she landed inside the window. She made sure to walk over to the couch before setting Lena gently down.

“Sit down and let me get you some water,” she said, and then super sped into the kitchen before returning in a blur to hand Lena a glass of water. “Drink all of this down.”

Lena was surprisingly quiet and just drank down the water as asked, so Kara went about getting things ready for both of them to go to bed – including blankets and pillows on the couch, and a big pitcher of water with some painkillers for the morning.

She also changed into her own sleep clothes, and she gave some spares to Lena, instructing her to put them on. Kara had just walked into the bathroom to brush her teeth when her phone buzzed.

> Alex: you owe me so big
> 
> Kara: ily  
Kara: also it’s sam who owes you
> 
> Alex: ….
> 
> Kara: think mandatory play days with ruby!  
Kara: you know you want to ask
> 
> Alex: …  
Alex: fine  
Alex: you’re right  
Alex: soooooo … how’s lena?  
Alex: <wink emoji>

Kara didn’t know how to respond to that, so she just stood there, staring at her phone. How did Alex know that Lena was flirting? Maybe she didn’t know and was just guessing? Kara stared at her phone. She blinked and glanced back to find long black hair at her shoulder. She’d been so focused on texting her sister that she didn’t notice that Lena had come into the bathroom with her until the CEO stepped past her.

“I’m changing in here,” she announced without preamble. “Your front room’s all windows.”

Kara froze, mouth hanging open, as she watched Lena immediately start stripping off clothes and drop them on the floor. As soon as her eyes took in the lacy bra and panties she was wearing, she tore her eyes away forward, only to find that she could still see Lena in the mirror in front of her. She quickly turned to face the wall, burning with a full-body blush.

“Oh my god, you’re adorable, Kara,” Lena said. “I don’t care if you look.”

Kara just made a strangled whimpering noise in response.

“Ok, I’m done, you can look again,” Lena said. Kara peeked quickly and saw that she was in fact clothed now, and turned back around. “You have a spare toothbrush?”

Kara nodded mutely, unsure if she could trust her voice yet, and dug around under her sink till she pull out one of her extras – something she always kept around in case Alex, Eliza, or one of the boys stopped by without warning. After giving it to Lena, she idly watched the other woman her brush her teeth for a bit until Kara had calmed down enough to feel like she could try talking again.

“You uh, seem less drunk now?” Kara tried hesitantly.

“Do I?” asked Lena, looking at the other girl in surprise. “I’m pretty sure I’m still drunk, we drank nearly a bottle of whiskey between us.”

“Well, you’re not swaying on your feet anymore,” Kara pointed out.

“Oh, that’s cuz I have loads of practice,” Lena said. “Also, I cheat.”

Kara snorted. “How can you cheat being drunk?”

“I’m leaning on the counter.”

Kara looked down and saw that that was indeed the case.

“Are you just gonna keep staring at me or are you going to brush your teeth too?” Lena carefully bent over to spit into the sink, moving much slower than normal.

“Oh, right!” Kara pulled out her own toothbrush and hurriedly got to work on her own teeth. By the time Lena had rinsed her mouth out she was finished. She leaned over to spit into the sink too, and then she almost inhaled all the toothpaste in her mouth when cool hands gripped her sides right above the line of her pants.

“Oh. My. God. Kara, are those your abs???”

Cool hands ghosted slightly up her sides and then crossed over into the front along the ripples in her abdominal muscles. It didn’t help that Kara had clenched them firmly in surprise at the touch so they stood out even more than normal. Everywhere Lena’s hands touched, Kara’s skin felt like it was on fire and she felt a heat build inside of her. She wanted more than she’d wanted anything in her entire life to turn around, push Lena into the wall, and start kissing her.

Kara tried open her mouth to respond but remembered she still had to spit out the toothpaste. After a long moment’s hesitation, she did just that, trying not to react when Lena’s hands followed her down to the sink and felt across the muscles rippling under cool hands. Then Lena’s breath hitched behind her and Kara almost lost it, but with epic restraint she finished rinsing out her mouth and straightened back up.

She turned to look at Lena, the drunk CEO's hands following her as she spun around, and found the other woman standing there with her mouth hanging open and her eyes blown wide. Kara almost forgot that Lena was completely smashed until she swayed the tiniest bit to one side, and that movement helped Kara shake off her ardor and focus. She couldn’t take advantage of her friend while she was drunk.

“Did you drink all your water?”

“What?” Lena asked, sounding dazed, hands still gently wandering.

“Come on,” Kara said, taking one of Lena’s hands of her stomach and leading her back to the couch. She settled the dark-haired woman on the couch, refilled her glass of water, and handed it back to her. “Drink all that up.”

Lena made a non-committal noise, but she started drinking from the glass of water. Kara busied herself making up the bed on the couch. Lena finished up the glass and handed it back to Kara wordlessly. Kara simply turned and refilled the glass again before handing it back.

Lena looked a bit mutinous at that, but she went back to drinking without comment again. About halfway through, she paused.

“I want to sleep with you,” she said plainly.

Kara spun around and stared at her, spluttering.

“In your bed,” Lena clarified.

Words still seemed to be beyond Kara.

“I don’t sleep well on couches.” The CEO took another drink of water.

Kara’s shoulders relaxed. “Oh,” she said. After considering for a moment, she said, “Ok then, you sleep on the bed and I’ll sleep here.”

Lena shook her head at this. “Nope, you need your sleep too.”

“But-”

Lena held up a finger with an expression like she was commanding a board room meeting. “I drink this water,” she said firmly, gesturing to the pitcher, “you sleep in your own bed along with me.” She continued drinking, like it was a foregone conclusion that this proposal would be accepted.

Kara could suddenly see how Lena had been able to save L-Corp almost single-handedly and get it thriving again. The superhero's shoulders sagged in defeat.

“Fine.”

In between drinks of water, Lena added, like it was of no concern to anyone, “Besides, it’s not like I’m going to be in any state to do anything anyways – I’m probably going to be out as soon as my head hits the pillow.”

Kara blushed furiously and decided to hide this by putting away the bedding she had set up on the couch, taking one of the extra pillows to the bedroom. Once she was done _and_ felt like she wasn’t going to spontaneously combust from blushing, she came back. Kara was coming to realize that drunk Lena was _very_ direct.

“Almost done there?” she asked, stepping back into the front room.

Lena nodded, drinking down the last bit in her glass. The pitcher sat next to her, empty. “I feel like I’m going to pop though – I think I should go to the bathroom before bed.”

Kara snorted a quick laugh. “Yeah, I think you should too.”

While Lena got up to do that, Kara turned off the rest of the lights in the apartment, leaving on the lamp she used when she had guests so no one would stumble around in the dark. After that she laid down in bed and waited. She would be lying if she said she wasn’t at least a bit nervous about what would happen when Lena came back. Kara recalled what had almost happened in the bathroom and gulped, suddenly having second thoughts about this agreement.

Lena stepped out of the bathroom and turned off the bathroom light, feeling her way up the bed to where the edge of the covers was. She slid in next to Kara and turned onto her side to face the blonde on the other side of the bed.

“Kara?” she asked.

“Hmm?” Kara replied, seemingly back to speaking in a strangled voice again.

Lena bit her lip then, and Kara nearly imploded on the spot. “Would you … would you hold me in your arms while I sleep?”

Kara thoroughly embarrassed herself by whimpering in response to that, and slapped a hand over her mouth as if that would stop anyone else from hearing it.

“Or … could I hold you?” Lena asked again, inching closer to Kara across the bed. “Just holding?” She reached out her arms and rested her hands against Kara’s arms tentatively.

It was that tentative touch, like Lena was almost afraid of the physical contact, that convinced Kara – and the blonde superhero's mind went back to Lena telling her that she didn’t have many friends, and with being raised by her adopted mother Lillian cold-hearted Luthor, Kara wondered if she had much physical contact in her life. It didn’t seem like she was trying to be at all sexual right at this moment.

Kara relaxed and nodded.

Lena wasted no time in scooting over and slipping her arms around Kara, sinking her head into the pillow with a grateful sigh. At the obvious comfort Lena found in this, Kara positively melted, and in turn wrapped her own arms around the other woman. Lena hummed in contentment, and it wasn’t long before Kara heard the other woman’s breathing and heart rate slow to the steady regular rhythm of sleep. It seemed she hadn’t been lying about falling asleep right away.

Unbidden, a slow grin spread across Kara’s face, and she felt undeniably happy holding such an amazing person in her arms, someone who obviously took that much comfort in her embrace. Kara felt like she had just won the lottery and saved all of National City all at once, and she would have wanted to fly in loop-de-loops of joy over the city – except for the fact that she most definitely didn’t want to let go of this moment. She had to stop herself from thinking about the fact that she was _holding __L__ena fucking __L__uthor in her arms __in her bed _or she would get too excited to sleep, so she settled for just listening to the other woman’s breathing and heartbeat.

It ended up not taking Kara that long to fall asleep either.


	2. Jess Gives Kara a Hand

When Kara opened her eyes again, it was bright and the sun was streaming in across the bed. She was warm and amazingly content. Kara hummed, shifting slightly to soak up more of the sun, and she snuggled more into the delightful warmth enveloping her.

Then the delightful warmth snuggled her back, and Kara’s eyes snapped open. She saw a mess of black hair and some pale skin in front of her eyes and suddenly the events of the previous night came back to her. She wasn’t sure if she should move or not yet – Lena’s soft breathing next to her meant the other woman was still asleep, and moving might wake her – because she felt like this perfect moment was so delicate that it might pop like a soap bubble and disappear into oblivion. For now, Lena didn’t appear to be awake yet so Kara could pretend everything was still fine.

She could put off worrying that things might not be fine when a sober Lena woke up and learned where she was and whose bed she was in. Kara frowned, then closed her eyes again. Nope, she wasn’t going to worry about that yet. Slowly the warmth of Lena’s arms still around her and the sun shining on the bed drew Kara back down into sleep.

Later, when the warmth in her arms started waking up, Kara drifted back to wakefulness. An arm released her, and Lena reached that arm up to rub at her face.

“Hmmm?” Lena breathed out sleepily, obviously not quite done waking up yet.

“Good morning,” Kara mumbled, refusing to move until she absolutely had to.

“Kara?” Lena asked, chuckling sleepily at the ‘mm-hmm’ she got in response. “Oh my god, I have to pee so bad,” she said, voice rough and cracking with sleep. She started trying to get up, and there was a moment of trying to figure out whose limbs were whose and untangling themselves before Lena was able to successfully stand up.

Kara whined as soon as Lena stood up, flopping back down on the bed dramatically, arm outstretched.

Lena giggled as she hurried off to the bathroom. “Stop it, Kara, I’m coming right back,” she said, half laughing.

Kara grumbled and shifted over to where Lena had slept, planting her face into the pillow and breathing deeply. She frowned when it still smelled like alcohol, but there was still a Lena scent there that she could pick up with her super nose.

Lena came back out of the bathroom to see Kara laying halfway over onto her spot, the blonde lifting her head up to peer at her sleepily, bed-head hair all over the place, and the CEO snorted in laughter. “Oh my god, you _are_just like a puppy.”

Kara huffed without fully opening her eyes and lifted up the covers in invitation. Lena slid herself back into bed, but was immediately distracted when she noticed that Kara’s overlarge sleep shirt had rucked up, and that her impressive abs were once again on display – she could fuzzily remember seeing them the night before. Suddenly, her actions on seeing said abs came back to her and she almost groaned outloud. _O__h sweet baby Jesus, had she really rub her hands all over __those admittedly amazing__ abs last night? Oh god, she __had__, __ha__dn’t she__?_

Kara didn’t seem to notice that Lena had frozen with her hands outstretched towards Kara’s abs, and lifted the covers to wrap over Lena before scooting forward – directly into Lena’s hands.

“Ooo cold!” Kara exclaimed in complaint, but she continued scooting forward into Lena.

“Sorry, I washed my hands and the water was cold,” Lena apologized, mouth running on automatic – all higher brain functions seemed to have stopped with the knowledge that Lena’s hands were all over Kara’s abs and wrapping around to her back under her shirt. She shifted her hands, feeling the play of back muscles under her fingers – and oh my god, she had well-defined back muscles too – while Kara shifted back into the position she had been in while they were sleeping, which meant-

Kara’s face was pressed against her chest.

Suddenly Lena felt like she was going to explode. Or her hands were going to start wandering, one of the two.

Kara mumbled something and shifted again, and in response Lena moved her hands to hold her closer, unintentionally lifting up more of the blonde's shirt. The young CEO's breath hitched, and like a nervous tick one of her thumbs started rubbing circles against Kara’s back. Lena didn’t know if the motion was to soothe Kara or soothe herself, because she felt like she was one giant bundle of nerves right now.

Lena didn’t have much time to think about this however, because Kara’s response to her moving hands completely undid her – Kara arched her back into Lena and moaned.

Lena couldn’t handle it anymore, and smoothly rolled Kara over onto her back and pulled her knees up to straddle the other woman, all in one movement. She cupped her hands around Kara’s face, who was staring at Lena with eyes blown wide open. Before she could second guess herself, Lena leaned down and in to nuzzle against Kara’s neck, planting kisses up and across her jawline till she captured Kara’s lips with her own.

The kiss immediately turned heated, all that pent up sexual tension from the night before finding release. Lena wasn’t thinking about anything other than the fantasy come to life that was currently moaning into her mouth.

It all came to a screeching halt when a loud buzz sounded from Kara’s nightstand, and both women froze. When the buzzing repeated insistently, Lena leaned back to let Kara roll half out from under her.

Swearing under her breath – which was a thing Lena had previously thought that Kara never did – Kara grabbed her phone and answered the call, registering what the caller ID was only after she’d picked up the call.

“Uh, Jess?” she asked, nervously, glancing quickly over at Lena. The CEO for her part looked over at the clock on the wall and gasped in surprise – it was past ten o’clock.

“Ms. Danvers,” somehow sounding both worried and relieved simultaneously. “Have you seen Ms. Luthor this morning?”

Kara looked up at Lena for confirmation, but she wasn’t sure if the CEO had been able to make out what Jess was saying on the other end of the line, so she went with a hesitant, “Yes?”

“Oh thank god!” Jess responded immediately. “I found empty bottles in her office this morning but she’d left both her phone and her purse and I thought the worst might have happened.”

Kara winced at the worry in Jess’ voice. She looked back over at Lena, who looked to be waiting to find out what was going on. “Um,” Kara continued, “let me put you on speaker, one sec.” She set the phone down and pushed the speakerphone button.

“Jess?” Lena asked.

“Ms. Luthor! Are you ok??” Jess asked urgently.

“Yes, I’m fine, sorry about that, things got out of hand last night but Sam was with me and Kara made sure I got home safe- wait, where’s Sam?” Lena asked, turning to Kara.

“Oh, she’s at my sister’s house,” Kara said. “I was way too tired to take care of two drunk hu- er, people, and both Sam and Ruby have been to Alex’s place before, so I figured it would be the better option.”

“And you couldn’t have let me know that you had her and that she was ok??” Jess asked in exasperation.

“I’m really sorry, Jess,” Kara said sincerely, “I was exhausted and wasn’t exactly thinking straight – I didn’t even see that her office light was still on until almost two in the morning, and we only just woke up now.”

Everyone was quiet for a beat or two while they absorbed this.

“What?” asked Kara in confusion, looking between the phone and Lena, even though Jess couldn’t see anything through the phone. Then both Lena and Jess spoke at the same time.

“What were you still doing out at 2:00am?”

“Why were you checking on my office at two in the morning?”

Kara started gesticulating awkwardly, fumbling with hands and words at the same time. “Uh! I was uh, I was helping Alex, and it was a late night, and I was heading past the L-Corp building, and I uh, I usually look up at your office window when I go by, and I just saw your light on!”

By the time Kara had rambled to a halt, Lena was trying hard not to smirk. As cute as it was, she felt the need to come to her rescue.

“Ok,” Lena said firmly. “Jess, what’s this morning look like? What’s been rescheduled and what got missed?” While she talked, Lena picked up the phone and strode over to the nearby dresser. She looked at Kara and mouthed “clothes?”

Kara immediately jumped up from the bed and started pulling out things as Jess went over how she’d shuffled things after finding Lena not in the office and unable to contact her. Of course, there were a lot of pastel cardigans and khakis. Lena accepted a plain white button-up shirt and a pair of khaki slacks.

“I still need to go home,” Lena said in a low voice intended to carry only to Kara. “Can you give me a ride?”

It seemed Kara’s phone was more sensitive than Lena thought, though, because next she heard Jess say, “What?”

Lena froze. _Shit_.

“Ms. Luthor,” Jess said, in incredulous tones, “are you not even at home?”

“Uh,” Lena said, apparently catching Kara’s habit this morning. “No, I’m not.”

Jess didn’t say anything for a beat. “Do you need me to call you a car?” Jess asked, this time her voice sounding perfectly neutral.

Lena looked at Kara, who nodded emphatically. “Yes, please, Jess. I don’t have anything here. Do you have Kara’s address?”

“Yes, I’ve got it here … alright, done,” Jess said, as if Lena waking up late and in the house of someone else was a regular occurrence for the CEO. Internally, Lena knew that there would be hell to pay for this later, and reminded herself to give her assistant a raise as soon as she could. “The car should arrive in 10-15 minutes.”

Kara frowned and looked at Lena reproachfully. “That’s not enough time to eat breakfast.”

Jess didn’t so much as miss a beat this time. “I’ll order something for you and have it waiting for you at your desk, Ms. Luthor.”

“Maybe a nice big water bottle, too?” asked Kara hopefully. “Or a bottle of a sports drink like Gatorade, my sister says those are the best for hangovers.”

This time Jess didn’t say anything immediately, and Lena just gave Kara a flat look.

“What?” Kara asked quietly, ducking her head a little.

“I’ll see what I can do,” Jess said diplomatically, after which point she signed off and hung up, being sure to get a promise from Kara to see Lena out the door in ten minutes.

“I have to get to work, too,” Kara said, rushing to get ready herself. The both had a bit of awkward fumbling as they tried to both use the bathroom at the same time. Somehow, they were both somewhat presentable by the time ten minutes had passed. Lena strode to the door and then turned around to look at Kara, who held the door open for her.

“Do you need a ride to work?” Lena asked, hoping she hadn’t gotten the other girl into trouble with her boss.

Kara paused for a second, as if trying to decide what to say, when she decided on the spot that she needed to be more open with Lena now. It felt to Kara like they had crossed some kind of line last night, and she could only go forward. “No, I can get there faster on my own. You just get to work.”

Lena nodded.

“Can I come see you for lunch?” Kara asked, heart in her eyes.

The CEO felt herself blushing in response. “I- well I’m probably in trouble, so maybe not lunch,” Lena told her truthfully, “but call Jess and ask her about my schedule? Maybe tonight after I get off work if it’s not too late?” Lena ran a hand through her hair and exhaled sharply. “It’s probably going to be pretty chaotic today to make up for the missed stuff this morning, and probably tomorrow too.”

“Ok, I’ll call you?”

Lena nodded.

“Ok.” Kara just looked at her for a moment, then closed the distance to Lena and took her hands in her own. “And take care of yourself.”

And then Kara did something that, despite waking up last night in Kara’s bed, in Kara’s arms, Lena had not been expecting – the blonde cupped her hands around Lena’s cheeks and kissed her gently, but briefly. She stepped back.

Lena seemed frozen for a moment, but then recalled herself to the present and turned to leave.

“I’ll text you,” the CEO said, and then hurried out the door. If she could get to work quickly and get as much done as possible, maybe today wouldn’t be a total mess.

\----------------

Today was a total mess, Lena decided.

She had arrived at work only slightly more than 30 minutes after hanging up with Jess, but other than a hurried breakfast between conference calls, she hadn’t stopped to take a break once. She hadn’t even gotten a chance to message Kara at all. And there was something else she had to do, too. She pushed the intercom button.

“Jess?”

“Yes, Ms. Luthor?”

“Would you like to put your meeting with me down on the schedule for the end of the day today or would you like to wait for tomorrow?”

Jess hummed, then said, “Today is fine, Ms. Luthor.”

“Very good,” Lena said, then turned off the comm. She reached a hand up and rubbed her temples. She’d had a low-grade headache all day, but the presence of those sports drinks that Kara had pressured Jess into getting had helped, so it wasn't as splitting of a headache as she normally had when she drank that much. The water that Kara had made her drink last night probably helped a lot, too.

It still turned out to be a day-long headache though, and Lena hadn’t had anything else to eat, so those two things combined with her enormous workload from her screwed up schedule still equaled a pretty awful day. Lena reached over and took another large drink from the bottle of neon yellow liquid sitting on her desk. As she reached for the next stack of papers, she idly wondered if that food coloring was broken down in the human body, or if passed back out again that same color. Despite the awfulness however, the one shining silver lining was that this day was rapidly closing in on its end. Lena dug into her pile of work to try and salvage something good out of what was left. She just hoped that Kara was having a better day at work than she was.

\--------------

Kara was not having a better day at work. She had run in late, and had managed to convince Snapper that she had been getting quotes – she’d even swung by and gotten them before coming in so she had something to show for being late – but in all the events of yesterday and last night she had forgotten that she had a deadline for a different article for noon today.

Looking up at the clock, she saw there was less than an hour remaining.

“Come on, ponytail, get it together.”

“I’m so sorry! I completely forgot-”

“I want work, not excuses.”

“Yes, sir,” Kara said, and she put her head down and got to work. Fortunately, she was able to squeeze in some surreptitious uses of superspeed to hurriedly re-read what she’d already written and write the parts that were missing. She dug through the piles of paper on her desk to find her quotes, wrote them down into the article, and with a final quick look-over she dropped the article onto Snapper’s desk. The clock over his desk read 11:59.

Snapper grunted in acknowledgement and waved her away, starting to read through it.

Kara went back to her desk and almost collapsed into it – using superspeed in controlled amounts and also monitoring around her at all times was tiring, and she’d had a long day yesterday too. She wondered how Lena was doing. She didn’t get much time to ponder, however, as just then a tip came in about a big accident a few blocks away.

“That’s you, ponytail,” Snapper called out to her. “No rest for the wicked.”

“Yes, sir,” Kara called back, grabbing her purse. Her being Supergirl would work to her advantage by letting her get to the accident almost immediately, even if it meant she would probably be doing some literal heavy lifting before she could report back on her story.

\--------------

Jess looked up at the ding of the elevator with her eyebrows raised. There wasn’t a scheduled meeting for another hour, and Ms. Luthor’s current meeting was a telecon so it wasn’t a late arrival. It could only really be one person who dropped by Ms. Luthor’s office unannounced, but after the debacle this morning, Jess had assumed she would know better than to turn up today.

Wouldn’t she?

Jess inwardly groaned when who else but Kara Danvers strode from the elevator after the doors opened, carrying a cardboard tray of drinks in her hand and a bag in the other. Jess set her stylus down with a small sigh.

“Ms. Danvers,” she greeted in her most neutral tone possible.

“Hi Jess,” Kara said with a sunny smile. Obviously Kara hadn’t picked up yet on the subtle hints that Jess thought she shouldn’t be here, and she continued walking right up to the front of the assistant’s desk. “I know you probably have a lot of work piled up so I thought you might need a pick-me-up,” she said, brandishing one of the cups from the tray she held. The blonde somehow juggled everything in her arms without dropping anything, and set the appropriate cup on the desk in front of Jess.

“Bribery, Ms. Danvers?” Jess said, glancing down at the cup. She had gotten fairly good at being able to read barista scrawl by now and could tell that it was her regular order.

“Just trying to be nice,” Kara replied, unfazed.

“Ah,” Jess said knowingly, shifting to cross her legs. “An apology then?”

Finally Kara relented and let her mask of perfect calm drop, ducking her head sheepishly. “Yes,” she said, embarrassed. “I’m so sorry about last night and this morning. I didn’t even think to call and I should have – it’s not like I don’t know what it’s like to be a CEO’s personal assistant. I just … it totally slipped my mind with everything that happened last night.” Kara blushed.

Jess did not miss the blush, and she blinked in surprise. Well, Jess had had her suspicions about why Ms. Luthor had given free access to her office to Ms. Danvers – access that, Jess knew, had very rarely been granted before – but she had assumed that the CEO was playing the long game in her pursuit, especially since she wasn’t sure that Kara even understood that she was being pursued. It appeared one night of drinking had changed that game though.

Jess frowned slightly, realizing that meant she’d probably have to start taking the possibility of new changes into account on Ms. Luthor’s schedule, and she picked up her stylus again to make a note of it for later. Hopefully, the transition period would be mostly smooth so she wouldn’t have to do too much rescheduling. She started making note of the important things that couldn’t be moved – or at least not easily – on the other days this week. She absently took a sip from the cup Kara had brought her.

“Jess?”

“Yes, Ms. Danvers?” Jess replied, not looking up from jotting down notes.

“Uh, is she busy right now?”

Jess looked up to see the blonde woman wringing her hands slightly. She took pity on the other woman and sighed.

“Ms. Luthor is currently on a call and she has three more meetings after that, but she should be finished by 8:30pm if not before.”

“Ok great,” Kara said, sunny smile back at full strength. “If it’s a conference call, could I bring in food? Or …”

Jess shook her head. “She’s giving the presentation so she won’t be able to eat until it’s over, but if you leave it here I’ll be sure to make sure she gets it as soon as it’s done. She’ll have time during her next meeting to eat it.”

Kara smiled gratefully. “Great, thank you.”

“Should I have her car standing by for 8:30?”

Kara blinked in surprised. “What?”

“If you’re going to ask her out to dinner, or take her somewhere, I can have a car waiting for her already so she doesn’t try to dive into any other work. It’s a good way of seeing her out the door on time,” Jess said, hoping Kara took the advice.

“Oh,” Kara said, and Jess could see the ideas percolating behind those blue eyes. “Yes, that’s a good idea. She said I should put something on her calendar.” The woman paused in thought. “She’ll be done by 8:30?”

“Yes,” Jess confirmed, “and if not I can call you to update the time or move it to tomorrow.”

“Then that would be perfect,” Kara beamed.

“Is there someplace specific where I should make reservations?” Jess prided herself on how she could make her advice or orders seem like innocent questions, and today she was going all out because it seemed like Kara needed the help.

“Hmm, I’m thinking a night in would be better – more time to sleep.”

Jess’ eyebrows leapt up. She had thought the blush earlier indicated that sleeping was not the major impetus, although she would certainly prefer that her boss slept more.

Kara continued after thinking for a moment, not noticing Jess’ reaction. “Um, I’m … well, she should call me when she gets off work. It’s probably better for her to go directly to her place and then I’ll bring food over. If you or she give me a heads up when she’s leaving then I can get to her place with hot food almost as soon as she walks in the door.”

“Do you have her address already?” Jess pulled up the address and started reading it off before the other woman could answer.

“It’s the big penthouse in the building next to the department store and bank on Sixth, right?” Kara asked, scribbling the address down on her work notepad.

Jess nodded. “That’s the one.” Well, it obviously seemed that Kara had been there before, even if she wrote down the address anyway.

After that, Kara said her goodbyes and left, and Jess couldn’t help smiling a little. The reporter would probably be good for her boss, considering how much she already tried looking out for the CEO, so Jess hoped this one worked out.

When it started getting towards the end of the hour, Jess tentatively tapped on the door and peered in, checking to see if her boss was off the call yet. Seeing her typing something out on her laptop, Jess let herself into the office.

“Ms. Luthor,” she said, approaching the desk with the cup and bag. When the CEO had looked up at her, she continued. “Ms. Danvers brought this by for you.” She set the bag and cup on the desk.

A soft smile spread itself across Ms. Luthor’s face, and Jess’ mouth quirked up in response. Her boss had been this way about the reporter almost from the first day the girl had come into the office, trailing after Clarke Kent from the Daily Planet. It was rather adorable, even if it did mean that Jess had to occasionally scramble, like finding out how to buy an entire flower shop’s stock and then deliver it to an office building that L-Corp didn’t own.

Jess felt a pang of guilt as she watched her boss tear into the bag – she probably should have made her take a break to eat at lunch, but she had only just arrived a few hours before that. Thankfully, Kara had stepped up.

She checked with Ms. Luthor that nothing else was needed and confirmed that there were no new changes to the schedule – Jess hadn’t told her about the plans Kara had made, but she hadn’t added it to the schedule yet so she could claim that it wasn’t a change yet. She planned to add it after Ms. Luthor started on her second to the last call, just so she wouldn’t get distracted. They were getting through so much work at this rate and Jess didn’t want to slow them down just yet.

Jess headed back out to her desk and tried to keep up with the bruising pace her boss set – she wondered if she even had time to eat the baguette sandwich that Kara had brought in between all the emails and project reviews.


End file.
